Here's a provocative book on how to organize a union: www.thenation.com/article/soci...

What shaped Mike Davis’s fierce critique of American capitalism? In a powerful tribute, Nelson Lichtenstein @nelsonlichtenstein.bsky.social maps Davis’s journey from New Left Review to City of Quartz and beyond. Read in LABOR: doi.org/10.1215/1547...

If you are interested in the fascinating and provocative career of Mike Davis you might find this retrospective on his work of interest. read.dukeupress.edu/labor/articl...

Leftists are now using the word "siblings" rather than "brothers and sisters" when addressing fellow unionists, activists, and movement people. I can see the gender logic, but siblings has little punch. How about "comrades?" That links speaker, writer, and audience in a common, fighting endeavor.

Why did corporatism take root in postwar Germany but not in the U.S.? In the first article of this special issue, @nelsonlichtenstein.bsky.social explores how both countries shared surprising similarities in the 1940s–50s—before diverging sharply in labor relations models. doi.org/10.1215/1547...

Here's an article I just published in LABOR: Studies in Working-Class History. A bit relevant to contemporary labor and left discussions over "sectoral bargaining." read.dukeupress.edu/labor/articl...

Samir Sonti and I have just edited a collection of essays on the labor movement derived from Dissent Magazine's 70 year archive. Here are some thoughts on how we can use that history today. thenewpress.com/blog/author-...

I am not one to find hopeful straws in the wind, but the Bernie/AOC set of rallies do seem to portend a tide of popular opposition to Trumpism. The Denver rally was his largest, ever. Notable has been his anti-oligarchy theme, which can be mobilized against a faction inside the Democratic Party.

My take on the how and why of a new union movement, even in these times. jacobin.com/2025/02/unio...

Trump is showing us who's on our side. Pretty much everyone. “They have built our coalition for us by virtue of the wide range of attacks by race, class, gender, legal status and more." From @lfelizleon.bsky.social @inthesetimesmag.bsky.social inthesetimes.com/article/labo...

Can we reconstruct a socialist educational experience? History may offer some guidance jacobin.com/2025/02/soci...

“What’s past is prologue.” – Roger Stone To understand 2025, go back to the #Nineties. Read my review of @lioneltrolling.bsky.social’s “When the Clock Broke” and @nelsonlichtenstein.bsky.social and Judith Stein’s “A Fabulous Failure” to learn why. #USPolitics www.phenomenalworld.org/reviews/back...

Here is the latest Labor and Working-Class History Newsletter. It is a post-mortem on the November elections. Many good interventions, including one that I put together on why the Biden Industrial policy initiatives had so little political impact. mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#in...

News reports say that tennis champion Novak Djokovic supports student protesters in his native Serbia. For years he has been or allowed himself to be identified with the nationalist and undemocratic ruling regime. Now I might cheer for him at the next match.

the venerable @nelsonlichtenstein.bsky.social identified this anti competitive behavior in his study of Walmart so many years ago.. glad to see the FTC is finally taking action

1977

1960?

Why was this post not filled 50 years ago? And should not all NR reporters be “class” reporters?

This is excellent! Either Be a Determined Opposition or Be a Loser portside.org/2024-12-20/e...

Our Fragile Juggernaut episode on labor in World War II is here, with the legendary @nelsonlichtenstein.bsky.social. What happens when you get full employment, price controls, mass migration to cities, and the integration of labor into the total war mobilization? podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/h...

Our collection will not be officially out until February 2025 but Publisher's Weekly seems to like it: www.publishersweekly.com/9781620978818

Martin di Caro is an excellent interviewer and he rounds out the questions and comments with many fascinating sound bites from the people and events being discussed. Sort of an audio take on my history of Clinton's economic policy. historyasithappens.radio.washingtontimes.com/the-new-econ...

Escape Artists was indeed useful in writing my economic history of the Clinton Administration and its legacy

My interview with @nelsonlichtenstein.bsky.social on Bill Clinton’s economic legacy is edited and ready to go! How much credit does Clinton deserve for the 90’s economy, and how do decisions on free trade, deregulation, and welfare reform hold up today? Publication date is 12.16

Nostalgic for the Nineties? I reconsidered America’s “holiday from history” for @phenomenalworld.bsky.social, reviewing @lioneltrolling.bsky.social’s “When the Clock Broke” and @nelsonlichtenstein.bsky.social & Judith Stein’s “A Fabulous Failure.” www.phenomenalworld.org/reviews/back...

Visiting my local bookstore, I found on the most prominent book table a brand new 2024 Princeton Univ. Press edition of Capital. This confirms, once again, what Andrew Hartman writes in his important, forthcoming Marx in America: "As long as capitalism persists, Marx cannot be killed."

Our collection will not be officially out until February 2025 but Publisher's Weekly seems to like it: www.publishersweekly.com/9781620978818

Amazon claims their delivery drivers are third-party. So why are they paying union avoidance professionals to “educate” them? open.substack.com/pub/caringcl...

@nelsonlichtenstein.bsky.social on the outlook for the UAW's next chapter in organizing the South. (open access) journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Add me to your labor research and policy list

You may be confusing my work with that of Gary Gerstle. While the fall of Communism in 1989-91 was a world historic event, most American political figures, left as well as right and center, had discounted the demise of Soviet communism as any kind of ideological threat to North Atlantic capitalism.

But Trump was a convicted criminal, an incoherent speaker, and a clear threat to democracy. So winning by even a small margin speaks volumes.

Trump's appointment of the moderate Republican, Lori Chavez-DeRemer, as his Secretary of Labor will not go smoothly. My July 2024 discussion of Project 2025 explains why: prospect.org/labor/2024-0...

Of course, employment at the federal level has doubled or tripled since the 1950s because so much of it is contracted out. All those Space X workers get most of their pay from the feds. I discuss this when recounting the Clinton Administration's "reinventing government" initiative in 2023 book.

If the entire world of labor resembled that which academic employees have created, 21st century union partisans would know what it felt like to live in the 1930s and 1940s.

Here I am with Shawn Fain. He had an old, hardback copy of my Reuther biography and I signed it for him.

I have just joined Bluesky. Anyone out there I know?